Need help!

[WH1987]

First off, I'm new to this forum and just wanted to say hello. I used to be a member of the Nebraska Game and Parks forum before they closed that one down, but I found the need to join another one for some of my questions.


Now, the main issue of this thread:

I killed a deer on Saturday morning near Lincoln at 7:50 am. It wasn't until about 9:30 that it was field-dressed. By 11:00 am it was in the back of the truck and on the way home. I let it hang until halftime of the Husker game and then skinned and processed it. So the skinning started around 4:00pm and everything was in the freezer by 8:00pm or so. While processing, I noticed that the meat didn't have the usual smell that I am familiar with. It was definetly a bit off. It wasn't like it was unbarable but it made me nervous. Now the high on Saturday was 54 in Lincoln and probably cooler in my garage. My question is has anyone had an experience like this before and had any problems? I'm hoping that it is just the smell and there won't be anything wrong with the meat. Any thoughts are much appreciated!

[Shorty]

You should be fine. I once killed and early season archery buck in September that took some time to find and we had a high above 80 degrees that day. We stuffed ice in the chest cavity and cut it up the next day without any issues.

I would recommend letting your deer go completely through the rigor mortis process (24 hours) before cutting it up. Cutting it up too soon can lead to muscle shorting which can make the meat tougher than it should be to eat.

[mkirk]

The meat is fine, i have let deer hang for longer time and warmer temps and have never had any trouble

[DiggerDog]

shorty and mkirk are both correct. The meat is fine.

[WH1987]

Thanks for the imput. Should I be concerned with the smell that was the one thing that had me questioning the whole thing.

[pjwatson05]

Originally Posted by WH1987

Thanks for the imput. Should I be concerned with the smell that was the one thing that had me questioning the whole thing.

So long as it doesn't smell rotten, did you hose out the chest cavity when you go it home, just curious could be were the smell was comming from.
The meat spoils from the bone marrow going sour & getting into the meat, it the meat was deboned you could let it hang for a week in these temps.

I harvested a buck at 5pm on Nov 5th & it was 70 degrees, got home & relaxed for a few hours skinned it about 10 pm & wasn't done butchering until 5 am & all the meat is very tasty, you should have no worries unless you gut shot it & didn't rinse out the chest cavity real well when you got home.